Developing a High Performing Team

Highly skilled project teams are always focused on individuals. If your business consists of employees that can compose such a team, you are on the way to success. Below we describe the main traits of high-performing teams, their roles, responsibilities and share the essential steps to create an incredible team.

What is a high performing team?

A high-performing team includes individuals who can productively collaborate and deliver outstanding results. This group of people knows and understands their goals, objectives, and values.

The members of high performing teams are mutually accountable for project outcomes and committed to reaching the company’s goals. They have different roles and responsibilities and work in sync. Usually, they are more agile in problem-solving.

What makes a high performing team

Many businesses over the world constantly care about team optimization. The Oxford Review admits that more than 8100 peer-reviewed research papers directly look at high performing teams.

Creating a high performing project team brings together different values, including upbringings, past work experience, individual skills, goals, and professional characteristics.

You can form any type of team, but for this aim, you will have to gather the best specialists who will be able to communicate, cooperate, and effectively perform in an atmosphere of respect and mutual trust. A robust team-building strategy and a strong personality are also required.

How to define the essential characteristics of effective teams? Take a look at the following list and evaluate what makes a truly high-performing team.

What are the traits of high performing teams?

Talented and motivated people always know how to help their companies achieve excellence and growth. However, the overall team harmony can be tainted because each individual has different beliefs and principles. Let’s explore the top-5 common characteristics of high-performing teams’ development.

1. A sense of purpose

When your teammates clearly define the company’s goals and mission, they have a sense of purpose and can professionally prioritize their tasks and duties.

2. Shared roles

Productive people ask for ideas and suggestions from their colleagues. They understand the critical role of each team member and value their insights.

3. Flexibility

Any efficient team should include flexible and adaptable employees. They easily adjust to any situation because variables don’t scare them.

4. Advanced communication

Communication is also a significant characteristic of a high performing team. People who are not afraid to express their opinion and thoughts are real professionals.

5. Mutual trust and respect

Trust and respect correlate with each other when it comes to a professional setting. If team members strive to be a part of a productive team, they should learn to trust and respect each other.

Now you know the key traits of high-performing groups, so it’s time to define the steps for their creating.

Consistent steps to create a high performing team

All the steps we’ll describe below can be included into 4 blocks:

• Planning.
• Choosing team members.
• Growing as a leader.
• Improving team management.

Let’s figure them out.

1. Plan ahead

Before forming and managing a high performing team, communicate the goal of your future team and how you are going to measure progress along the way.

A clear plan with specific dates will help to define how your team’s success will look like. Use to-do lists, calendars, or an online Gantt сhart maker to visualize your plans with all the tasks needed. Here’s how timelines look in GanttPRO:

2. Invite the best candidates to your team

Choosing people who can complement each other is one of the most critical steps while creating a high performing team.

Think about how you will use people’s talents to achieve your end goals. Invite people who can get the job done. They must persuade you that they can fulfill their roles and responsibilities.

3. Define their goals

All employees should agree on the team’s goals and values. Your team members should understand their work, the outcomes, and how they should reach those goals.

4. Foster diversity

Building a diverse team provides unique ideas and opens more perspectives. Try to hire people from different backgrounds with different attitudes and philosophies. Diversity will help your team to solve problems from different viewpoints.

5. Designate expectations

Team members should continually strive to accomplish the plans of the entire team and focus on a specific part of the project. Make sure their designated positions are clear and precise.

6. Define strengths and weaknesses

Work on the things that you are weak on every day and stimulate your strong sides. Ask for an honest evaluation of your leadership to understand the problems in your leadership style.

7. Motivate your team

Managers should drive their teams towards success by giving them the encouragement that they need to do well. It can be everything from inspiration by your abilities to being rewarded for excellent work. Do not hesitate to demonstrate your care.

8. Improve communication

Managers should be able to show how to communicate and encourage transparency effectively. Listen to what people say — they can shed light on issues from their perspective or point out something you’ve missed.

9. Expand respect and trust

To reach respect, work hard, and gain the team’s admiration. Your positive attitude, leadership style, experience, knowledge, and ability to settle conflicts will help.

10. Run meetings

Weekly and daily meetings are an essential part of many teams’ workflows. Effective meetings require creating a clear plan of items that you will discuss beforehand and applying handy project scheduling software.

11. Conduct team-building activities

Team building management accelerates internal collaboration and communication. You can find various team-building exercises, fun games, and problem-solving activities for this aim. These activities should be run weekly or monthly to be the most effective.

12. Be a coach

Underperforming team members may need your special attention and coaching. Good leaders should identify issues in someone’s working habits and find solutions to remedy them. Explain the areas you think the person is underperforming in and think of strategies to improve their performance.

Conclusion

Creating a high-performing team is the direct responsibility of any manager. Try your best to develop your leadership skills and follow the steps that we’ve mentioned above. Look at the bigger picture to increase your chances of developing the best team ever!

For more details, dive into the full article How to Build a High Performing Team https://blog.ganttpro.com/en/how-build-high-performing-team/.